p53 polymorphism and human papillomavirus infection in Hong Kong women with cervical cancer

In this study we investigated the involvement of p53 polymorphism at codon 72, the infection and typing of human papillomavirus (HPV) and the correlat ion of p53 polymorphism with HPV type and other clinicopathologic character istics in 72 Hong Kong women with cervical cancer. We developed a simple an d nonradioactive method for determining polymorphism at codon 72 of the p53 gene. The homozygous p53 arginine allele (Arg/Arg) was detected in 22 (31% ), the homozygous p53 proline allele (Pro/Pro) in 14 (19%) and the heterozy gous allele (Arg/Pro) in 36 (50%) cases, respectively. Using the consensus primers MY11 and MY09, HPV infection was detected in 55 of 72 (76%) cases. The prevalent types were HPV-16 (55%), HPV-18 (16%) and HPV-58 (9%). The nu mber of HPV-positive cases with Arg/Arg, Pro/Pro and Arg/Pro were 17 (31%), 12 (22%) and 26 (47%), respectively. The p53 polymorphism at codon 72 was not significantly correlated with any of the HPV types (p > 0.05). No strik ing overrepresentation of homozygous arginine-72 p53 was observed in HPV-as sociated cervical cancer. The results in this study did not show that any p 53 polymorphic form has a prognostic significance for cervical cancer. Copy right (C) 2000 S. Karger AG, Basel.